


The Art of Quantum Architecture

by cassowarykisses



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Canon Compliant, Developing Relationship, Dialogue Heavy, F/M, Season 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-22
Updated: 2014-09-22
Packaged: 2018-02-18 09:00:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2342693
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cassowarykisses/pseuds/cassowarykisses
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Improbable things are supposed to happen around quantum engines. Really, is it any wonder Brainstorm keeps coming down to talk to Nautica there?</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Art of Quantum Architecture

“Hey there.”

Nautica peered out from underneath the harness containing one of the quantum drums, safely locked in their bays within the engines, and was greeted with the sight of one of Brainstorm’s feet kicking at the drum right above her head.

“There’s no way that’s safe,” she protested, pushing herself out into the room, nearly colliding with Brainstorm. He cursed and hopped awkwardly sideways, hitting one of his wings against the wall.

He looked down at where she lay on the floor. “Like crawling under them is safe either,” he huffed, “Earlier you wouldn’t stop talking about the necessary safety procedures for working with them – “

“Oh, those are mostly for show,” Nautica said, sitting up. “Really, with quantum engines you just hope that nothing goes wrong with them, and since they’re getting constant wear from moving the ship and running the internal power and weapons systems, it’s so statistically unlikely that they’d survive more than a short while that you actually get very few failures. I was just making sure they were correctly hooked into their berths before we made the next jump.” She leaned down and reached under the drum, searching for her wrench. “Anyways! What did you come down here for?”

She could hear Brainstorm shuffling his feet, even without looking at him. “Oh! Nothing much, really. I’ve just run into a couple of roadblocks on my newest projects and there’s not much to be done about that but just take a break and come back fresh, haha.”

“Even by my standards, that laugh sounded fake, Brainstorm,” Nautica said, standing up with her wrench in hand. “And believe me, I’m not very good at … that kind of stuff.”

Brainstorm exvented. “I came down to talk. You’re the only other one on the ship besides Perceptor who can work out my projects, and  _he’s_  too tied up with … well, whatever he’s doing. He never lets me in his lab to see.” He scowled above his faceplate. “As if he thinks I’d steal his projects! I could come up with something better than them in a day, tops.”

Nautica blinked. It was hard a lot of the time to figure out the context of people’s relationships. Four million years of history condensed into three weeks was a lot of statistics and maps and battlefield reports. There hadn’t been time for people’s opinions or emotions. And then she fell into situations where  _everyone_  knew what to think or say and she didn’t get it. That was why it had been so much easier to travel with Chromia and Windblade – between the two of them, they could get her out when she was too enthusiastic about the wrong thing.

After a pause she said, “You can?”

“Well, duh,” Brainstorm said, lighting up. “Like – “ his voice wavered, and he glanced around the room, finally settling on her arms. “ – that wrench of yours.”

“Yes?” Nautica said warily, holding it up.

Brainstorm pointed at the wrench, hands darting in almost close enough to touch it. “Perceptor would say that since it does its job as a wrench, there’s no need to improve it!” His optics flashed. “I, on the other hand, say that  _everything_  can be improved. Imagine if we had stopped at combustion engines!” He paused for a moment. “Actually, think of all my inventions as like your quantum engines.”

“The more improbable they are, the more likely you’ll make them?” Nautica asked. Cybertronian etiquette wasn’t quite the same as it was on Caminus, but it was probably a good time for an interjection.

“Exactly!” Brainstorm exclaimed, throwing his hands up. “You’ve got to think outside the laws of the rational universe, because everyone else is already working inside them.”

“Can you show me?” she asked, then reconsidered. “Show me with something that isn’t a weapon.” It felt strange and bitter, that that needed to be said. But still, she was more than a little proud of herself there, for clarifying. It was coming easier nowadays, even without Chromia beside her.

“Is that a dare?” Brainstorm asked, head snapping towards her with excitement.

Nautica glanced down at the wrench in her hand. “… Not really?” she ventured.

Brainstorm deflated immediately. “Oh.”

She scrambled to back the conversation up. “I’d like to see it! Whatever you come up with. But it’s not a dare.”

“What, did they not have dares on Caminus?” Brainstorm asked. “Cause that sounded like a dare to me.”

“Chromia probably would have said so too,” Nautica admitted. “But I’m saying it’s a challenge.”

“And the difference is … ?”

“Well,” she said, pausing slightly. “I’ve always thought ‘challenge’ sounded more heroic. Don’t laugh!” she protested, before Brainstorm could do anything. “But I’ve read all the literature I could get my servos on – Camien and alien and Cybertronian – and none of the heroes talk about  _dares_ , and they were my inspiration to leave Caminus. I mean. Windblade and Chromia being there helped, too, but I’d thought about it before. You don’t get built to be space-capable and  _not_  think about – “ She cut herself off before she could devolve into rambling.

“Huh,” Brainstorm said at last. “I thought you were more of a non-fiction type of person.”

“Only recently,” she said. “History was the most important thing. But now, I’m starting to get caught up on culture – when Crosscut’s play comes out, I want to see how it’s different from what they put on in the playhouses on Caminus, and I’ve been going to  _all_  the movie nights, even the ones with alien movies.” Nautica realized partway through her sentence that she had been gesturing with her wrench, and pulled it back to her chest. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I know you don’t go those, I shouldn’t be going on about stuff I know you don’t care about.”

“No, no, it’s fine,” Brainstorm said. “I’ve watched plenty of movies. Just – “ he broke off for a second. “Not in the past couple of months.” He clapped his hands together. “And I’ve already had several ideas, so I’m off. Got to see this challenge through.” He darted out past her.

Nautica watched him leave. It was tempting to run off after him and try and watch him defy physics and rationality, but it was still her shift. She glanced back at the quantum drum. It could be in the right state of quantum inertia to defy physics itself in a couple of hours. (She found it best to not use words that came to close to quantifying the probability, so “probably” and “surely” were right out.)

She glanced back at the door. Brainstorm would be long gone – he moved  _fast_ , for someone who claimed he’d only seen the front lines by accident – but there was Swerve’s. And the newest issue of the  _Insider_  to publicly debunk.

Mass media must have been dead for so long on Cybertron, if that’s what passes for quality reporting, Nautica thought as she triple checked the clasps around the quantum drum. It wasn’t good to leave everything to improbability, even as she dusted herself off and headed for the door.

****

Nautica had gotten used to seeing Brainstorm around. He took her excited impromptu speeches about just how unusual the Lost Light’s engines were in stride, and really, that was all it took for her to warm up to someone, even if they  _had_ had a bit of an awkward start.

She hadn’t expected him to show up with a package in his hands.

“Open it,” he insisted, holding it out to her emphatically.

Nautica frowned down at it. “I’m on duty.” Skipping out on a shift once in a week was probably enough. Things weren’t as bad here as they had been during the worst of it on Caminus, but old habits died hard.

Brainstorm rolled his optics. “Oh come on! You seriously think either of our ‘co-captains’ - ” he made finger quotes around the word – “are keeping up with strict shifts?”

She sighed, and held out her hands. “That’s true. Come on, give me the box.”

It was covered in some sort of foil, the fancy kind that didn’t tear easily. She unwrapped it, and pulled out a wrench. Or at least a … kind of wrench-shaped object.

“Do you like it?” Brainstorm asked. She’d expected him to be bouncing with excitement, or talking about how great it was, but he was looking at her nervously. She thought it was an expectant look, too – she was getting better at reading expressions on bots with facemasks. They weren’t common on Caminus, and she was mostly relying on her memories of how Windblade emoted with her wings.

He continued, “It’s primarily your standard wrench, but I merged the quantum principles behind my early warning system into it – I know you don’t like blindly following things, so instead of calculating the probability of danger simply by being there, it constantly scans the environment and tells you what possible dangers are present.”

“The same way the quantum engines understand and synthesize data about the ship’s entire environment,” she said quietly, turning it over in her hands. The warning light was glowing a pale, non-intrusive green.

“I thought you could use it,” Brainstorm said, his optics following the motion of her hands. “The engines can be unpredictable – did I ever tell you that we lost a crewmate to them on our first launch?”

“No!” Nautica exclaimed, temporarily distracted. “Was he affected by the instability field?”

Brainstorm shrugged. “Unless there’s something else that could cause an acute case of being melded into the engines, yes. We had him pulled out back on Luna-1.”

Nautica let out a low whistle. “That’s a difficult trick to pull off,” she said. “I’ve never fiddled around with quantum foam like that before.”

“It wasn’t that bad,” Brainstorm said, waving his hand dismissively. “The foam had dissolved his body, so all we had to do was cut out the casing that was holding the bits on the outside up and replace it. Easy as outsmarting a Terrorcon.”

“Still,” Nautica said, glancing down at her new wrench. It seemed like the wrong time to ask what, exactly, a Terrorcon was.

Brainstorm watched her, tilting his head concernedly. “Hey,” he said, holding out a hand towards her like he wanted to give her one of Chromia’s friendly backpats, but only knew the theory behind how touching other peopled worked. “I built that wrench so you wouldn’t have to worry about that. The prediction system will get you out of danger, guaranteed.” He flicked his wings. “And it’ll work on any kind of danger, so your worries about Decepticons – “ He stopped, and amended his sentence. “Well, your worries about pirates, or the Galactic Council, are over.”

Nautica flashed a smile, and tightened her grip on the wrench. “I certainly don’t want to be anywhere near the Galactic Council,” she said. “You know, they used to bother us on Caminus all the time.”

“… That was probably our fault,” Brainstorm said. “Our reputation was pretty widespread, by the peak of the war.”

“And for the wrong reasons, too,” Nautica said, giving her present an experimental swing.

“I’m sorry?” Brainstorm asked, confusion clear in the hitch of his wings.

“I just – “ she started, and grinned ruefully, shaking her head. “It’s just – people would kill for a prediction system like this, anywhere across the galaxy. I’ve never seen one like it, and I’ve been on more than one alien ship.” She caught the inquisitive tilt of his head and added, “Thunderclash was making a point of seeking them out, and talking to them about the Ammonites. Trying to improve relations that way.” She shook her head. “That doesn’t matter. What I mean is, it’s an incredible invention, but everybody thinks about you – us – like all we can do is come up with new ways to kill. This could save so many lives, Brainstorm, even with the Tyrest Accord!”

“To be fair, I mostly do weapons,” Brainstorm said. “But the war’s over, so that market’s dying down.” He shrugged again. “I’ll try to build anything at least once.”

Nautica put her hand on top of his. “You should make these more often.”

“What, really?” he asked, wings pulling back sharply.

“Yes!” she said. “The rest of the crew would love it.”

Oh,” he said. “I don’t know – I mean, they know me mostly as ‘the gun guy’ so -“

Nautica returned to spinning the wrench around in her hands, careful not to press any of the myriad switches on it. It was probably best to do that in a controlled environment. As in, away from the volatile engines keeping them moving. “You said yourself the war was over,” she pointed out. “The market’s dying down.”

“There’s always a market for wrenches, I guess,” Brainstorm said.

She smiled. “I’m always open to them.” Nautica held out a hand. “The engines are stable, and I doubt our captains are paying attention. I want to go show everyone what this does.”

“I’m open to that,” Brainstorm said, optics glowing warmly. “Let’s hit Swerve’s first. They’ll listen to anything in there.”

“Including everything in the  _Insider_ ,” Nautica said, wincing slightly.

“Who cares about the  _Insider_?” Brainstorm exclaimed. “All publicity is good publicity.”

“Oh, you’ve been in it before?” Nautica asked, then sighed. “Of course you have.”

Brainstorm laughed, and she thought he was grinning under his mask. It was hard to tell, sometimes, who had a face and who was simply good at faking it. “I’ve been in more issues than Rodimus!” he crowed. “C’mon, let me tell you about this one time. Of course, Trailcutter tells it differently, but I had been working on an invention to freeze time, so you could fire it over a battlefield and then go down and pick off the other side …”


End file.
